Butterflies in area indicators of warming trends

Gail ComptonWildlife Discoveries

Published Saturday, February 03, 2007

No, you are not imagining things -- butterflies have been active all winter. No matter where I went, the St. Augustine Shores wildflower meadow, my own front yard, or visiting area parks, I saw butterflies. Sulphurs, zebra longwings, gulf fritillaries, and monarchs are among those I saw during warm days in November, December and into January.

We don't need weather reports or meteorological experts to tell us we are in a warming trend. Plants, birds and insects will tell us volumes about weather patterns. Several people have called over the last two months reporting adult butterflies, caterpillars, chrysalises and newly emerged butterflies in their yards. Fred Whitley, who is in charge of this gardening section, kept me informed of the happenings in his yard. Two weeks ago he called and reported he found a monarch butterfly chrysalis attached to shrimp plants next to his milkweed plant.

He searched regularly to try to find more chrysalises, but they are well disguised and difficult to find. Shrimp plants make good hiding places for chrysalises because of the green leaves and strong stalks. Butterfly caterpillars seek out protected places to go through metamorphosis (the pupal stage). Monarch chrysalises are, at first, green capsules with beads of gold around the top. As the caterpillar transforms into an adult butterfly, the opaque green chrysalis gradually becomes transparent and the newly formed adult inside can be seen, folded wings and all.

When Fred called me to say his chrysalis had turned transparent and he hoped to see it emerge, I wished him good luck. I've managed to see a butterfly emerge only once and that's because a friend saw a chrysalis in her yard begin to split and I rushed over to sit for two hours and watch the whole process. As the butterfly emerged, its wings were tightly folded and the butterfly hung upside down on the chrysalis to allow fluids to slowly pump into the wing veins, expanding the wings to flight condition.

Suddenly, with one convulsive sweep of the wings, the new butterfly flew off, scattering golden drops of expelled fluid behind it. As bad luck would have it, Fred missed the emergence and first flight of his monarch. But he arrived to find two monarchs darting around the shrimp plants and the chrysalis broken open and empty. Both monarchs eventually flew next door to a large oak and disappeared. Butterflies like wooded areas to shelter overnight and in stormy or cold weather.